This comic may not contain any actual aliens.

Therapy Session 1

I wrote a bit about my depression and other medical issues before, but I don’t think I’ve ever felt as bad as I do now. It’s gotten to the point where I feel like I’ll never be able to lead a happy life, that everything I’m doing is futile.

The only positive thing about my life is the comics I’m drawing and that’s it. But… those comics aren’t doing so well either, my inability to update them reliably is really taking it’s toll on me.

I started AHS to get some practice with comics, be done with it in a few years and move on to the next project. So much for that pipe-dream, because now I feel like I wont even finish AHS in my lifetime, let alone the other comics I wanted to do. I can’t just ignore this anymore like I could a few years ago, when I didn’t have as much to worry about. It fucking kills me that after all this time I’m still not at any of the remotely exciting parts of AHS. The pacing of my comics totally werks guise.

So, in order to try and preserve the only good thing I have left in this miserable existence, I’m going to take a step back for a while and take a hiatus from the comic to re-examine things.
(Kinda shooting myself in the foot a bit because no more Patreon funds during the hiatus, but I feel it’s necessary.)

I’ll need to focus not just on improving my art, but on working more quickly. If the pain in my arm is here to stay, I’ll have to find a way to be more efficient with it at least.

And while I’m practicing, maybe draw a few things I’ve always wanted to, to hopefully cheer me up a bit. Like this one:

Session 1: Some demons I guess?

Demons consume humans and absorb their life force. They also have a complete disregard for human life and are incredibly cruel, never trust them! Though they don’t normally have sentient tails.
I want so badly to be at the point in the story where these guys start appearing, but you know…

So, did this feel good drawing make me feel better? Did this “therapy session” work out?

15 Comments

Well. I wasn’t expecting any creatures like this to show up! This works nicely as a teaser in a way.

I don’t know if you should worry so much about being slow. I’ve enjoyed every page so far! If you keep making pages, it’ll eventually get finished, right? Maybe that is a bit too simplistic and optimistic of me. Planning is a good thing to do. Man, I’m bad at giving advice, and it took me years to finish a sloppy ms paint comic, ha. Well, I still wish you the best! Do whatever you think is necessary! Er, just as long as you aren’t thinking that suicide is necessary. Because that’d be bad.

this pic is adorable ^^ i hope you feel better, i just finished recovering from a cold, so i know some of what you’re going through. i hope your hiatus works for you. also, i’d love to see more stuff like this.

It can take a fair amount of easter-egging to find the right combination of prescription drugs and professional therapy to turn things around, but trust me when I tell you that you’ll know when you find it.

I like the picture. Both the art and the depiction of emotion. Plus of course that head on the tail. Please be proud of your talent, which I’m sure is, to a large extent, the result of dedication and a lot of practice.
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I hope your flu goes away soon.
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Based on my own experience, I feel that depression is like having s**t colored glasses welded to your head. So I hope it lets up for you, or that you can make it let up somehow, and soon. If not, no judgement!
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Warning: following contains advice, or at least some things to look into. I realize you may be sick of that sort of thing, so feel free to stop reading at any time.
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-Depression is awful enough, and, unfortunately, real, but it also can make other things seem worse than they are. This doesn’t necessarily mean the other problems aren’t just as real, or even just as awful, just that your judgement may be skewed. Please keep that in mind. Hard to do, I know.
-Medication CAN help. In our house, it works quite well for me and partially for my wife, with relapses. Especially in February. I realize that sometimes the various suggestions people have to improve your mood can be impossible or just not enough for where you’re at, but please try to do what you can to take care of yourself and to find something that works.
-I found that I could enjoy, or at least appreciate, Dresden Dolls music even when I was very low. I don’t know if it was good or bad for me, but it was the theme music for my depression, simultaneous break up, mourning, etc. Use at your own risk.
-I’ve had some experience with inflamed tendons. I think I’ve already mentioned ice packs, rubbing with peeled Dixie cup of ice, etc. I’m under the impression that a Hitachi Wand (yes, that kind) can help, at least with my wrist problem. But that’s based on little data. Maybe not worth it unless you have one lying around.
-I wonder if “eccentric” exercise can work on wrist tendons. I think it helped a lot with an inflamed tendon insertion on my heel. This means resisting instead of pushing or pulling. For all I know, it may be canonical for wrist problems. It wasn’t canonical for my heel. Also, the particular range of motion can, in some cases, matter quite a bit. It apparently does for my heel (heel drops only to level). I notice that a web search brings up some interesting stuff, including this paper: http://www.ijtmb.org/index.php/ijtmb/article/view/153/212 I can’t vouch for it’s accuracy, but it seems plausible to me. Note the time scales for recovery.

If I may say so, I really do not think your art *needs* any improvement. I’m not saying that there isn’t any place for it, but your drawing is already gorgeous, the characters are cute, endearing… well, I hope you get my point.

Now, drawing faster, yep, this might be a good thing, if it doesn’t hurt you more than your current pace.

And, maybe, if the comic is very important to you, you might consider enlisting another artist for help. I mean, I’m pretty sure that your story has a very good potential, and, if your drawing style is respected, then you might be able to draw one page out of several, with your help “dishing out” the rest. It might help reduce the delay between two updates, while still getting your comic online, and still getting Patreon revenue.

As someone who loves good art, and has suffered from depression, all I can do is add my voice to the chorus:

Please. Get some help.

After I’d been on antidepressants for a while, I finally discovered how it felt to not be overwhelmed by depression and anxiety, and realized that it wasn’t just “the way it is”. Yes, things still take a bit more effort than I’d like, but it doesn’t feel impossible anymore. I’m still kind of a gloomy, grouchy guy a lot of the time, but I no longer spend any of that time wondering if it’s even worth trying.

And yeah. It’s totally worth trying.

I love your characters, I love your artwork, and as much as I’m looking forward to seeing where this is going, I’m guessing it’s only a fraction of how much you look forward to showing us, to having something in front of you that used to live only in your head.

Good luck getting over your flu (and any other sneaky bugs that follow), and seriously: find some help. Not preaching, not judging, just saying from experience: Help is possible, and worth finding.

If production pace is bothering you, why not tell part of the story in something closer to a storyboarded sketch form? We’ve seen your art, (it’s great), and you can always speed things up by trading some visual quality for a faster workflow. Either way, the the stories you tell, and the pictures you share, are definitely worth the wait for the audience.

As for the rest… it’s hard to believe your head is lying to you when your head controls all the evidence. I can’t think of anything really helpful to say, but stuff gets better, stuff gets worse. In my case the big problem was that I became blind to the ‘getting better’ part, so all I ever saw was the getting worse. That can turn into a really nasty feedback loop. In my case, it helped to treat it as if I were seeing in black-and-white in a color world: “There is color/good out there, I’m just not capable of seeing it right now”. In my case, keeping a consciously neutral (positive was too much to ask for) attitude tended to smooth out the worst of things, and eventually I woke up one day and realized that it had been a few months since I truly felt depressed.

Of course, a lot depends on why it’s happening. Chemical issues versus cognitive processes. Taking meds doesn’t usually help much if the issue is that you’ve become blind to the positive side of life (although it can help by temporarily skewing you away from that headspace), and all the positive mental attitude in the world won’t help if the real problem is simply a neurotransmitter imbalance, or something chemical but less simple.

Chronic pain is a complication that can put even a cheerful person into a negative emotional loop. Since it saps energy all the time, it can easily help a negative outlook creep up on you, and leave you blaming yourself for your depression, which of course just makes things worse.

As for your art, I’ll keep stopping by to see it even if you start barely sketching the art. The story looks to be compelling in its own right, and I’m looking forward to experiencing it however you choose to share it, at whatever speed you choose.

As someone who also suffers and knows people who suffer from it as well, I understand to an extent what you are going through. There are many here that have that understanding as well. We won’t judge you or preach at you. We will all lend our ears and eyes should you need them.